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"Ah, the Hunter has finally returned home." You recognise the voice even if you can't see him. The one who is responsible for all the pain in your life, the one who turned you into a weapon and gave you your title.
"Yeah, I'm home," you spit, lips peeled back in anger. "Now show yourself!"
Laughter echoes in the room, drowning out your snarl of frustration and walls move, revealing where you're really standing. You know this room, you know the pristine white walls that encircle you for you spent your childhood here. Your childhood of fighting, killing and hunting, it was all done here, within these dreaded white walls that served as your prison. All the while he would watch from up high, smiling behind the thick glass that separated him from his weapon.
"Indeed. Perhaps I should." The man you hate more than anything else in this world steps out from behind the safety of the glass room, his white lab coat swirling around his ankles. He looks the same as he did when you were a child, the same face that makes you freeze, ice creeping through your veins but you're not that child anymore. You've changed, grown, overcome the past, and you're so much more than what Hydra made you.
Or so you've been told.
Smiling, he signals for more guards and they fill the room, weapons pointed at you. Your hands tighten around your twin pistols, ready to pull the trigger and start a fight you can win but then a wall moves with a loud rumble, revealing a sight that stops you dead in your tracks.
They have Bucky.
"I wouldn't suggest doing anything rash, my dear child. Who knows what might happen to your precious Asset?" With a snap of his fingers, two more guards appear in the separate room where Bucky kneels, hands cuffed behind him, a blindfold over his eyes.
You growl, mind racing as you desperately try to find a way to get the both of you out of here. There's too many guards, and you won't be able to get to Bucky before the guards inside lay their filthy hands on him. Shit. Think of a plan now, Y/N, or Bucky dies. Or even worse, you get captured and Bucky dies. This can't happen, you won't let Bucky die. You can't. You promised to watch his back, you have to keep it.
A quick glance to the right reveals a keypad, probably the one for the door next to it that looks like it leads to the room Bucky is held in. You could knock out the doctor and his guards then destroy the keypad which will let you into the room, but looking at the doctor, he wants you to do just that. Playing right into the doctor's hands is not an option, there has to be another way, some plan you haven't thought of yet. Your mind frantically scrambles to formulate an alternative route to take, but he's faster. He always is. Even after all these years away from Hydra, trying to better yourself, you still can't beat him.
The doctor chuckles, as if reading your mind and places his hand on the keypad. The keypad lights up, turning green with a beep and the door slides open, hissing. With a smile, he steps inside, taking a gun from one of the guards.
"I've always wondered, what exactly triggered the beast within you? I could never make a manual trigger, something about your powers prevented me from influencing your mind. So then I began analysing all the times you went feral, hoping to find a common factor in all of them and I think I've found the answer." He taps the muzzle of the gun against Bucky's head, causing a growl to erupt from your throat. The guards who remain in the room with you immediately curl their fingers around the triggers in response, ready to fire at a moment's notice.
"And what would the answer be?" You force the urge to slaughter down, swallowing hard. Controlling the animal within is something you've practiced time and time again, you can do it now. Your muscles quiver with anticipation, eager to pounce but you keep your yourself firmly rooted to the ground.
"I think," he smiles, turning to face you. "The beast is triggered when someone whom you've allowed yourself to get close to is in danger. Allow me to prove my hypothesis."
A loud band echoes in the facility and suddenly everything turns red. Your body moves on its own, blood roaring in your ears as you lunge towards Bucky. Your pistols fire, causing two guards to collapse immediately and you dodge the bullets aimed your way.
It doesn't take long for you to close the gap between yourself and one of the remaining guards, pressing the barrel of your pistol to his chin. You pull the trigger, unperturbed by the blood that sprays all over your face and turn to face the remaining guard who's shaking, your eyes blazing in fury. A low snarl later and that guard falls to the ground, splattering more blood over the once pristine white floor.
You empty your magazine into the keypad with a howl and barge into the room, a singular target in your frenzied mind — the doctor. You barely register the call to use non-lethal force from the doctor, your pistols falling from your hands as electricity races through your veins, causing you to crash to the floor. White hot pain floods your body and for a moment, all you see is black, but then your vision swims back into focus. You're on the floor, chest heaving, boots surrounding you.
"Truly, my finest creation." The doctor kneels next to you, lifting your head up by the chin. "Such pure animalistic instincts, a hunter to the end."
The boots move closer to you as the doctor lets go of your chin. "Take him to the laboratory, I want to improve upon perfection. Oh, and escort the Asset back to his cell. There's no harm in reconditioning him."
Recondition? Wait, Bucky is alive?
Your ears pick up the frantic beating of his heart now that the blood lust has faded and a wave of relief washes over you.
Bucky's alright. The shot that was fired must have been a blank. No, Y/N, focus. They're going to recondition him if you don't do anything right now. Get up! Get up now!
Your fingers curl into a fist and the moment a hand touches your arm, you swing. With your other arm, you grab a knife from the guard's belt and stab it into its owner's arm, eliciting a howl of pain. Your training takes over and the blade flashes silver while your eyes flash golden, leaving bodies in your wake. Yanking another knife from a corpse, you leap into the air and slam both blades into a guard's eyes, gouging them out with a savage fury. The doctor simply stands there, ignoring the blood that's pooling at his feet and watches you approach.
Crimson clings to your skin and hair as you stalk towards the last remaining enemy, tightly gripping the knives in your hands. The doctor smiles at you, then laughs, even as you press a blade against the pale flesh of his throat.
"What a hero you are, Hunter. Even after trying so hard, you still succumb to the beast inside you, oh what will your fellow heroes say when they see the mess you've made? What will your dearest Bucky say?"
"Shut up!" You snarl, pressing the blade just deep enough to nick into flesh. His words are more than enough to snap you out of your blood filled haze, and terror begins to creep into your heart.
What will Bucky say about what you've done?
"Don't worry, child. I'm so proud of you and what you've become. Perfection, in the flesh." He steps closer to you, letting the blade cut deeper. "A true hunter."
He coughs once, twice, then collapses into the pool of blood at his feet. Dead. The knives clatter to the ground and you scramble to rip the blindfold off Bucky, exhaling sharply when familiar ice blue eyes meet yours.
"Buck —" You don't know what to say. The gory mess all around the two of you speaks volumes, and there's nothing you can do to defend your actions. You have slaughtered a whole two rooms full of people, ripped them apart with bullets and blade alike like the savage beast you try to control. You're still a monster deep down, a killer, a murderer, and you're afraid of what you are.
The stickiness of the blood on your hands hits you hard and you pull away from the man you love but he falls right into your chest, head resting on your shoulder. The blood on you smears on his cheek but he doesn't care and buries himself deeper into your warmth.
"You came," he whispers. "Thank you."
He closes his eyes and the both of you simply kneel there for a while amidst the crimson and silence, taking in each other's presence.
"I'm glad you're here." Bucky breaks the silence first. "But you were stupid for walking right into their trap."
"Couldn't see any other way to rescue you." You gently push him off you and take the keys to the cuffs from the doctor's corpse. "You came first, before everything else."
"That doctor said he created you. Told me that you were his perfect weapon and that I was making you blunt, so he had to remove me." Bucky rubs his raw wrists, gazing at you with concern.
"He…was the one in charge of me. He experimented on me, gave me my powers, selected the trainers who honed my skills and gave me all my orders. I suppose you could say he created me." You're tired, more so than usual. That fight shouldn't have drained you to this point, but you feel so exhausted.
"How are you feeling now that he's dead?" Bucky wraps his arms around you, his touch gentle and pulls you into a hug.
"I don't know. Empty? Nothing? Am I supposed to feel something?"
"You don't have to." He presses a gentle kiss to your forehead. "Shall we go home?"
"You still want me?"
"Why wouldn't I?"
"Because I'm clearly a beast, a monster. I could hurt you, like I hurt them." You gesture at the bodies that litter the area. "I'm afraid of what I might do."
"It doesn't mean you can't learn to control it." His voice is soft, his hands slipping into yours.
"I clearly can't!" You howl in irritation. "I've been trying for so long, training so hard, and this is the result! I can't control it!"
"Then, perhaps we need to learn to live with it. The animal inside is a part of you after all. We'll figure this out together, I promise." He gives your hands a squeeze. "But first, let's go home and clean up, alright?"
"I don't understand how you're so at ease with this." Your gaze is downcast, avoiding him at all costs.
"Well, I did promise to love every single part of you, and the animal within falls under that category." He places his flesh hand on your bloody chest. "We will learn to live with the animal, that I swear. You won't be alone, you never will be."
"I —" You exhale deeply, cautiously placing a hand on top of his. "I — alright. We'll give it a shot, but promise me another thing."
"Yeah?"
"Promise me, if I ever turn the animal on you, you'll kill me."
"Love, I can't —"
"Promise me! I can only guarantee a moment of hesitation if I ever fully lose control of the animal, and I need you to take that chance to end it." You press your forehead against his. "Please."
He swallows, throat bobbing as he fights for an answer, then concedes. "Alright, I promise, but we're going to do all we can to never reach that point, understood?"
"Mmm." You hum softly, causing Bucky to smile.
"Home?" He asks again.
"Home." This time you reply.